■Ll^ 



ADDRESS 

Major John W, Paniel, 

(Formerly ^ssl. ^jd^l. Gen'l C. S. A. oq the SlafTofGen, Jubal A. Early,) 

pF Lynchburg, Va,, 



llKrORE THE 



At their Annual Jvleeting, held l;i the Capitol 
iiz (RichvAond, Va., Oct. -^Sth, iSyj. 



^.(? 



" One of those few battles of wliich the contrary event would 
have essentially varied the drama of the Avorld in all its subsequent 
scenes." — Hallam. 



"Stop: for thy tread is on an Empire's dust, 
An Earthquake's spoil is sepulchred below. 
Is the spot mark'd by no coUoesal bust? 
Nor column trophied for triumphal show? 
None : but the moral's truth tells simpler so, 
As the ground was before, thus let it bo : — 
Now that red rain hath made the harvest grow." 

Cbilde Harold. 




LYNCHBURG : 

BELL, BROWNE & CO., PRINTERS. 
1875. 



.51 






Published by order of the Virginia Division of the Army 
of Northern Virginia. 

GexXERAL W. H. F. lee, 

President. 
George L. Christian, 
Leroy S. Edwards, 

Secretaries. 



ADDRESS. 



Felloiv Soldiers of i lie Army of Northern Vlrghia : 

Not with the ringing bugle nor the throbbing drum in our 
van, nor with the battle-flag floating proudly o'er our " tat- 
tered uniforms and bright muskets," come we again to the 
historic city which was once the busy arsenal and the glow- 
ine heart of the Confederate revolution. 

Stately palaces now line the avenues so lately filled with 
charred and smoking ruins. The fields around us smile in 
cultivated beauty where lately trod the iron hoof of war 
" fetlock deep in blood." The lordly river, no longer grim 
with batteries on its banks, and iron-clads upon its surface, 
nor choked with obstructions in its channel, rolls its majes- 
tic tides in unbroken currents to the sea. And save here and 
there, where some rude earthwork, overgrown with grass 
and weeds, scars the landscape, fair nature tells no tale of the 
devastation of civil strife. 

But long after the demeutsf of changing seasons, and the 
slow process of time, have obliterated from the physical 
world every scar and stain of conflict, ihe scenes around us, 
animate with their heroic actors, aaS oe portrayed to other 
generations with all the vividness ^f\ftrtist's brush and poet's 
song ] and faithful chroniclers jgp^ recount to eager ears the 
story, which has made the name of Richmond not less mem- 
orable than the name of SSSBSBt Troy, and has immortalized 
those more than Trojan heroes, the devoted citizen-soldiery 
of the Army of Northern Virginia. 

Surviving comrades of that valiant host, I hail you with a 
comrade's warmest greeting. In Virginia's name I welcome 
you back to Virginia's capital city, amongst those generous 



people who nerved your arms by their cheerful courage, who 
bent over your wounds with ministering care, who consoled 
adversity by fidelity, and plucked from defeat its sting. 

Here to-night we come as men of peace — faithfully render- 
ing unto Ca3sar the things that are his — but happy to touch 
elbows once more together in the battle of life, and proud 
to revive the cherished memories of the " brave days of yore" 
and to renew the solemn and high resolve that their bright 
examples and great actions shall not perish from the records 
of time. 

Happier, indeed, would I have been if, on this occasion, the 
task of reproducing some page of your famous history had 
been confided to other and abler hands than mine ; for in 
this distinguished presence, with my superiors in rank, ability 
and military services around me, the soldiers's sense of subor- 
dination creeps over me, and I would fain fall back into the 
ranks of those who are seen but not heard. 

But since it is I who am appointed to play the role of the 
old soldier 

" Who shoulders his crutch 
Auil shows how fields were won" 

I bow obediently to orders, trusting that the splendor of my 
themes may obscure the deficiencies of your orator, and that 
your generosity — as characteristSc'o^tKe soldier as his cour- 
age — may sheathe the critic's sword ifi its scabbard. 
•♦ I * -^ 

THEiftfi SUGGESTED. 

In their courteous lettj^'*,o^ij3yitation your committee ex- 
pressed the desire that I shotrld select as the subject of my 
discourse some one of the gre at cam paigns or battles of the 
Army of Northern Virginia. J^'d," acceding to their wishes, 
I reviewed in my mind the long line of its splendid achieve- 
ments, no little embarrassed, by their very variety and bril- 
liancy, in fixing attention upon any particular one. There 
was no campaign of that matchless army that did not abound 
in glorious exploits of both generals and soldiers. There 



was no single action, whatever its result, that draped the 
battle-flag in dishonor, and it is a significant fact — an eter- 
nal eulogy in itself to that stout-hearted band of heroes — 
that it was never driven in disorder from any field of battle 
under its enemy's fire, until when, worn out by ceaseless 
strife with constant levies of fresh men, it was overwhelmed 
by Grant at Petersburg, and closed its career with undimin- 
ished glory on the field of Appomattox. 

INDECISIVENESS OF THE VIRGINIA BATTLES. 

But there is this equally remarkable fact in the history of 
the Army of Northern Virginia — that almost all of its engage- 
ments were attended by no decisive results. The capitals 
of the two belligerent nations (Washington and Richmond) 
were but one hundred and thirty miles distant, and that por- 
tion of Virginia lying between them became an immense 
ampitheatre of conflict, within which the armies of the Po- 
tomac and of Northern Virginia, like fierce gladiators, re- 
peated from year to year their bloody contMfe, with for- 
tunes varying only sufficiently to brighten hope or beget 
depression, but continually postponing the glittering prize 
which each aimed to attain. 

To and fro — from the heights around Alexandria, whence 
the soaring dome of the national capital loomed up before 
the Confederate's vision, back to these memorable fields 
around Richmond, whence the Federal pickets sighted its 
tempting spires-trolled the incessant tides of battle, with 
alternations of success, until all "Northern Virginia became 
upheaved with entrenchments, billowed with graves, satura- 
ted with blood, seared with fire, stripped to desolation, and 
kneaded under the feet, hoofs, and wheels of the marching 
columns. 

At the first battle of Manassas the cordon of fortifications 
around Washington prevented a rout from becoming an 
annihilation, and that battle only decided that other battles 
would be needed to decide anything. 



6 

At Williamsburg McClellan, who succeeded McDowell, 
the displaced commander of Manassas, received a sharp rebuff, 
which decided nothing but that the antagonists would have 
to close together. 

At Seven Pines the fall of our skillful General Joseph E. 
Johnston, at a critical moment, and the consequent delay 
which enabled Sedgwick to cross the swollen waters of the 
Chickahominy, ended the prospect of making that more than 
a field of gallant and brilliant endeavor. 

At Malvern Hill a curious mistake, which led one subor- 
dinate to pursue a wrong road, and the lamentable delay of 
others, combined with the really valorous defence of that 
key-position, extinguished the high tide of victory in the 
volcanic fires of that battery-crowned summit, and closed with 
the escape of the enemy to his gunboats and the disappoint- 
ment of his adversary. 

The second field of Manassas, in which the redoubtable 
John Pope, Mff) having seen before " only the backs of his 
enemies," entered the fact of record that his curiosity was 
entirely satiated with a single glimpse of their faces, was 
only the prelude of a more deadly struggle at Sharpsburg ; 
and as Manassas only decided that it would require another 
effort of the Federal army to beat us on our own soil, Sharps- 
burg only decided that we would have to gird our loins once 
more to overwhelm it upon its own. 

At Fredericksburg in December, 1862, Burnside, having 
blindly hurled his army agaj^t JLee's entrenchments, man- 
a^J torepeatUiemaMeu)^ ot French King, who '^marched 
uptlie hill and down again'^and to regain the opposite 
bank of the Rappahannock without a foot of ground lost or 
won — leaving that ill-starred field behind him as a memorial 
of nothing but wasted life and courage on the one side, and 
cool, steady, self-poised intrepidity on the other. 

And at Chancellorsville, in the spring of 1S63, when' 
Hooker assailed bv flank the same field which Burnside 



charged in front, a famous stroke of generalship, directed by 
Lee and executed by Jackson, placed him side by side on 
the stool of penitence with his predecessor. But there a 
great calamity planted a thorn in the crown of victory, gave 
pause to the advance of the conquering banner, and turned 
to safe retreat what promised to be the rout and annihilation 
of the Federal army. That calamity was the fall of " Stone- 
wall" Jackson, Lee's incomparable lieutenant, whose genius 
had shed undying lustre on the Confederate arms, and before 
whose efRory to-day the two worlds bow in honor. 

And so the end of two years found the twQ, ar.mies still 
pitted against each other in the same arena, with proud 
Washington behind the one still egging it to the attack for the 
honor of the old flag and the solidarity of the Union ; and 
defiant Richmond still behind the other, upholding it with 
words and dee^s of cheer, and bidding it never to weary in 
well doing for the^cause oi liberty and Confederate indepen- 
dence. 

p 

THE CRISIS OF 1863. 

But while the status of the combatants in Vircfinia had 
received no decisive changt^it became obvious in the spring 
of 1SG3 that an hour big with destiny was near at hand. 
The Army of the Potomac had become disheartened by con- 
tinuous adversity. Five chosen chieftans — McDowell, Mc- 
Clellan, Pope, Burnside, Hooker — had led it to battle in su- 
perb array ; but its ranks had only been recruited to march 
again to defeat and decimation. The term of enlistment of 
nearly 40,000 of its rank and file had now expired,* and as 
they marched to the rear, homeward bound, no counter 
column was moving to supply their vacant places. With 
the northern people, hope of victory deferred, had made the 
heart sick of strife, and the " Copper-head" faction, like the 
Republicans of Paris when Napoleon was marching against 
the allied armies of Waterloo, was agitating schemes against 

*See Vol. I, Conclnct of the War. 



the government and the prolongation of the war. The 
paper currency, like a thermometer on tlie stock exchange, 
showed that the pulse of the popular faith was beating low. 
Factory hands, without cotton to spin, cried for bread, and 
were not content to take muskets and go to the feast of 
blood. Foreign powers had lost confidence in ]\[r. Seward's 
three-months' promissory notes of victory, which had been 
so often renewed and had now gone to protest ; and it is said 
that our diplomatic agents abroad authoritativel y announced^ 
that sliould Lep ^ablish now a lodgment in the North^his 
triunipli ^ould be greeted with the long-sought boon of for- 
eisrn reco"rnition. 

On the Confederate side our line of battle, although in the 
east unbroken, was but an iron shell with emptiness within. 
IIun<rry mobs had been rioting through Richmond with the 
fearful cry of " Bread !" " Bread !'' The^j^tions had not 
only beeiijSwept of their provender, but^the tillers of the 
soil and their beasts of burden had llliHWJiiP been absorbed 
into the ranks of war. And to increase the gravity of the 
situation our western horizon was overhung with omens of 
disaster. There the progress of the Union arms had been 
steadily forward. Missouri, Kentucky, and parts of Ten- 
nessee and Arkansas had been conquered. Along the Mis- 
sissippi river, Columbus, Island No. 10, Fort Pillow, Mem- 
phis, and New Orleans had fallen ; and now Vicksburg, a 
solitary sentinel upon its banks, alone prevented the Father 
of Waters from " rolling unvexed to the sea." 

This post, like a ligature upon an artery, severed the 
Federal line of military communication from the Northwest 
to the Gulf of Mexico, and isolated the Western States from 
their markets. Its early conquest was foreshadowed, and 
with that the northern heart would be again fired with hope 
and a blow struck into the very vitals of the Confederacy. 

THE PROJECT OF INVASION. 

Could the hitherto invincible Army of Northern Virginia 



now launch forth a telling blow against its adversary, and 
anticipate the bursting of the storm cloud in the West by a 
sunburst of decisive victory in the East, disaster there would 
be counterbalanced, if not forestalled and prevented. The 
peace party of the North would be reinforced in numbers 
and strengthened in resolution ; recruits would be deterred 
from enrolling under the blighted banners of defeat ; the 
bonds and Treasury notes of the United States would rapidly 
decline in value, thus relaxing the sinews of war; and foreign 
powers, hungry for cotton, and weary of idle factories and 
freightless ships and marketless wares, would stretch forth 
the hand of recognition, and welcome the young battle- 
crowned Confederacy into the family of nations. The broad 
military mind of General Lee fully compassed the crisis, and 
he boldly projected the scheme of forcing Hooker from his 
position opposite to Fredericksburg, expelling Milroy from the 
Valley, and, to use his language, " transferring the scene of 
hostilities beyond the Potomac." 

THE SEQUEL AT GETTYSBURG. 

The sequel of this plan of operations was the battle of 
Gettysburg, fought in the heart of the enemy's country. 
There for three days the two armies wrestled over hill and 
plain in terrific struggle. There, on the third day, the most 
magnificent charge of infantr^iknown in the annals of modern 
war, closed with the bloody repulse of the Confederate 
assaulting column. 

And while Lee was marshalling his troops in front of 
Cemetery Ridge, the white flag was flying over Pemberton's 
works at Vicksburg. 

Those memorable days marked the meridian of the Con- 
federate cause. It was not then extinguished, but its sun 
paled, and descended slowly to its setting. 

As the water-shed of the AUeghanies is the division-line 
between the waters which flow eastward into the Atlantic 
ocean and those which empty into the Gulf through the 



10 

Mississippi Valley, so Cemetery Ridge marks the turning 
point of the tides of battle. Up to that rugged crest they 
rolled in triumph, pouring the trophies of victory into the 
lap of the Confederacy. Beyond they rolled in sullen and 
gloomy turbulence toward the final catastrophe of Appo- 
mattox. 

These considerations induced me, Comrades, to invite your 
attention to the campaign of Gettysburg. 

I know it requires no little courage to fight a battle ''o'er 
again" — but those whose valor deserved success need never 
shrink from the memory of adversity. 

PRELIMINARY MOVEMENTS IN VIRGINIA. 

On June 3, 1S63, General Lee broke his camp before 
Fredericksburg ; and leaving Hill's corps to watch Hooker's 
army, which was separated from it only by the Rappahan- 
nock river, turned the heads of Longstreet's and Ewell's 
corps northward. His design was to draw Hooker out into 
the open field and defeat him before crossing the Potomac. 
But in this he was disappointed, nOt so much by the skill of 
his adversary as by the absence of harmony in his councils. 

Hooker's plan was to cross the Rappahannock, fall upon 
Hill with his whole army, and then make a bold push for 
Richmond. Had he made this •effort Lee intended to take 
him in flank ; and the result I scarcely think would have 
been doubtful. But Mr. Lincoln positively forbade Hooker 
to make this attempt, quaintly saying that he (Hooker) would 
thus become " entangled upon the river like an ox jumped 
half over a fence, and liable to be torn by dogs front and 
rear without a fair chance to gore one way or kick the other." 
On the contrary, Lincoln desired Hooker to attack Lee's 
army while stretched out on the line of march ; and on the 
14th of June, the very day that our vanguard struck Milroy 
at Winchester, we find him sending Hooker another charac- 
teristic messj^e from Washington : 



It 

" 3Iajor- General Hooker : So far as we can make out here 
the enemy have Milroy surrounded at Winchester and Tyler 
at Martinsburg. If they could hold out a few days could 
you help them ? If the head of Lee's army is at Martins- 
burg and the tail of it on the plank road between Fredericks- 
burg and Chancellorsville the animal must be very slim 

somewhere.* 

A. Lincoln." 

So it happened that Lincoln, not liking Hooker's plan, nor 
Hooker Lincoln's (which was concurred in by Ilalleck, com- 
mander-in-chief at Washington.) neither was adopted. And 
Hooker contented himself (after sending a corps south of the 
Rappahannock and then withdrawing it,) with falling back 
to the vicinity of Fairfax Court-house and closely hugging 
his entrenchments. 

In these preliminary movements all the advantage in gen- 
eralship and in results was on the Confederate side. Hooker 
has been much complimented for supposed skill in his ma- 
noeuvres, but they were the result of his quarrel with Lin- 
coln, and not of design ; and the reports show that he was 
in a state of great perplexity and indecision, on one day dis- 
patching to the Government his opinion that invasion was 
Lee's " settled purpose" and " an act of desperation,"! and 
two days later suggesting that the movement was a mere 
cavalry raid, "a cover to Lee's reinforcing Bragg or moving 
troops to the West."| 

lee's MAKCII TO PENNSYLVANIA. 

While Hooker thus crouched under his heavy works, Lee 
marched triumphantly toward the Potomac ; and on the 14th 
of June the first laurel of the campaign was plucked by 
Ewell at Winchester, where a billiant flunk movement, con- 
ceived by General Early and executed by his division, with 

''See Vol. I, Conduct of the War— p. 2G0. 
tSee Vol. I, Conduct of tbe War— p. IGl. 
tSee same Work — p. 271. 



12 

the co-operation of Johnson's, resulted in tlie capture of that 
place with four thousand prisoners, twenty-three pieces of 
artillery, three hundred wagons, three hundred horses, and 
an immense supply of much-needed stores and munitions. 

On the same day General Rodes captured at Martinsburg 
one hundred prisoners and five pieces of cannon ; and thus 
the great northern highway, " the Valley pike," was cleared 
of all obstructions and the gate to Pennsylvania thrown 
open. 

On the 15th of June General Jenkins with his cavalry 
crossed the Potomac. Within the next ten days the three 
infantry corps of our army, under Longstreet, Ewell, and A. 
P. Hill, likewise crossed, and on the 24th of June the whole 
Army of Northern Virginia, in magnificent fighting trim, and 
flush with victory, stood upon the enemy's soil. 

THE MOVEMENTS OF THE CAVALRY. 

While these movements were progressing, the cavalry 
under Stuart had several times crossed sabres with the 
troopers of Pleasanton, without detriment to their own repu 
tation or that of their General. And in leaving Virginia 
with his main force, General Lee had taken every precaution 
to utilize these " eyes and ears" of the army by sending them 
to watch and impede Hooker's movements. His orders to 
General Stuart were ^' to guard the passes of the mountains 
and observe the movements of the enemy, whom he was in- 
structed to harass and impede as much as possible should he 
attempt to cross the Potomac. In that event General Stuart 
was directed to move into Maryland, crossing the Potomac 
east or west of the Blue Ridge, as in his judgment should 
be best, and take position on the riglit of our column as it 
advanced." (Lee's first report.) 

In operating under these instructions an untoward circum- 
stance occurred which eliminated the cavalry from the availa^ 
ble forces of Lee, at a time when he most needed it, Stuart 
had followed closely upon the rear of Hooker in Fairfax and 



13 

Loudoun counties, when, upon the 24th of June, the latter 
determined to fall back no further, and suddenly threw his 
army forward into Maryland to seize the Turner's and Cramp- 
ton's gaps of South Mountains, near Boonsboro, which cov- 
ered the line of advance from Lee's army to Baltimore through 
Frederick, Maryland.* 

The effect, though not the design, of this movement was 
to throw Hooker between Stuart and Lee, and as the former 
was crossing the Potomac at Edward's Ferry, near Leesburg, 
it became necessary for Stuart to make a wide detour south 
in order to cross above him, or to cut in between Hooker 
and Washington, and pass northward, in order to re-join his 
Commander. Acting within the discretion given him, (and 
not otherwise as some have supposed), Stuart adopted the 
latter route as the shortest, crossing at Seneca Falls. t 

But unfortunately Hooker continued his march northward, 
continuously interposing himself before Stuart ; and thus, 
when he had advanced so far as to be right upon the flank 
of Lee's only line of retreat to Virginia, the latter, who had 
distributed his forces near Chambersburg, Carlisle, and York, 
was utterly ignorant of the enemy's movements, and receiv- 
ing no message from Stuart supposed that Hooker still re- 
mained on the Virginia side of the Potomac. 

lee's concentration for battle. 
On the night of June 2Sth, (not the 29th, as stated in 
Lee's first report,) a cavalry scout of General Longstreet's 
rode into that officer's headquarters, near Chambersburg, 
with the momentous tidings that the Army of the Potomac 
had crossed the river and was then gathering near Frederick, 
Maryland. Hooker was thus in position to seize the South 
Mountain passes and cut off Lee's communications. General 
Lee was at the time about to push forward and capture Har- 

*See Vol. I, Contlnct of the War— p. 169. 

tSee General Lee's Second Report in Southern Magazine for Aug., 1873, 
p. 210. 



u 

risburg, the capital of Pennsylvania, scarce a day's march 
distant, which, being defended by militia mainly, under 
General Couch, could not have withstood the assault of our 
veteran troops. But with Hooker thus on his flank and rear, 
the continuance of the scheme became hazardous, and he 
determined at once to concentrate his army east of the moun- 
tains, thus threatening Baltimore and Washington, and in 
order to deter the enemy, to use his langnage, " from advan- 
cing further west and intercepting our communications with 
Virginia." Accordingly the movement against Harrisburg 
was abandoned, and the next day General Lee issued orders 
for the concentration of all his troops at Cashtown, a village 
five miles from Gettysburg, and on the direct road which 
passes through that place to Baltimore. 

hookek's plan. 

The report of Longstreet's scout was true, and Lee had 
keenly divined his enemy's intentions; for Hooker had moved 
forward into Maryland and had given directions to General 
Reynolds, who commanded the right wing of the army, to 
seize the mountain passes which have been mentioned, and 
to take position at Middletown, in rear of them, in the valley 
between the South Mountain and the Cotoctin range. At 
the same time he had himself gone to Harper's Ferry, 
whence he proposed to move with the Twelfth corps and the 
garrison there of 11,000 men directly upon Williamsport, 
thus severing Lee's line of communication to Virginia, and 
stopping the transit of supplies which he was sending back 
in immense quantities from Pennsylvania. 

On the morning of the 27th of June he had seated him- 
self and was engaged in writing an order for the abandon- 
ment of that post at daylight, with a view to proceeding 
with this plan of operations. But just at that moment a 
dispatch was received from General Halleck requiring the 
garrison to remain there. The latter officer, whose self- 
conceit was only equalled by his incapacity, excited the in- 



15 

dignation of Hooker by thus trammelling him, while in the 
ffice of Lee's army, with instructions full of folly ; for Har- 
per's Ferry at this juncture was a stragetic point of no 
earthly consequence ; and rather than submit to such inter- 
ference he at once requested to be relived of command of the 
Army of the Potomac. His request was at once granted. 

GENERAL MEADE. 

On the night of the same day Major-General G. C. Meade, 
commanding the Fifth corps of the Army of the Potomac, 
was asleep in his tent near Frederick, Md., when he was 
aroused by General Hardie, a bearer of dispatches from 
Washington. Meade, who had severely criticised Hooker 
for his alleged incapacity at Chancellorsville, supposed that 
he was about to be placed under arrest by that officer, who 
had threatened to do so, and he immediately inquired of 
General Hardie if he came for that purpose. The latter, 
evading the question, struck a light and placed in his hand 
an order directing liim to assume command of the Army of 
the Potomac, "and committing to him all the powers of the 
Executive and the Constitution, to the end that he might 
wield untrammelled all the resources of the nation to meet 
the emergency of the invasion." 

On the next day, June 28, while yet Lee was threatening 
Harrisburg, Meade assumed command ; and on the 29th, 
ignorant that Lee had abandoned that movement, he deter- 
mined to move at once from the vicinity of Frederick toward 
Harrisburg, to compel Lee (to use Meade's language) " to 
loose his hold on the Susquehannah and meet him in battle 
at some point." Accordingly, on the very day that Lee's 
columns moved eastward toward Baltimore, in order to coun- 
teract a supposed mancBuvre upon his communications, 
Meade, equally ignorant of his antagonist's change of front, 
moved northward to stay a supposed advance upon Harris- 
burg. And adding to these complications, Stuart, who had 
swept around Meade's flank, was at the same time moving 



16 

toward Carlisle, he himself being as ignorant of Lee's inten- 
tions as Meade, and supposing that he would find his com- 
mander upon the line of the Susquehannah. Now, right in 
the line of Meade's northward march, and of Lee's eastward 
march, lies the old-fashioned town of Gettysburg, and to 
that point the two hostile forces were now converging, each 
in utter darkness as to the other's movements, and little 
imagining that that sequestered hamlet was destined to be- 
come the scene of a tremendous struggle, which would make 
its name resound throughout the ages as memorable as that 
of Waterloo. 

THE 30111 OF JUNE. 

The 30th of June was a day of busy preparation. On 
that day the new commander of the Federal Army issued 
his orders of march, directing the seven corps of which his 
forces were composed, to move as follows : The Third 
to Emmettsburg, Second to Taneytown, Fifth to Hanover, 
Twelfth to Two Taverns, Sixth to Manchester, while the 
First and Eleventh, constituting, with the Third, the right 
wing, under Reynolds, were to proceed with Bu ford's cavalry 
division to Gettysburg. That same morning, Pettigrew's 
brigade, of Ileth's division. Hill's corps, which had been 
ordered to Gettysburg to procure shoes and supplies, ap- 
proached that place on the Cashtown road, and its head of 
column had reached the crest of Seminary Kidge within easy 
cannon-shot of the town, when at the same time the advance 
of Buford's cavalry reached the town from the opposite di- 
rection.* The Confederate brigade retired to Cashtown, 
some five miles distant, and, Buford occupying the place, 
established his division in front, along or near the line of 
Willoughby run, covering the approaches to it by the Cham- 
bersburg, Mummasburg, Carlisle, and Harrisburg roads. 
General Reynolds, with the First and Eleventh corps, came 
at the same time to within a few miles of Gettysburg, on 
the Emmettsburg road, and halted for the night. That even- 

**Gen. H. Heth confirms this statement. 



17 

ing Meade became satisfied, from tidings received, that Lee 
was moving towards Gettysburg ; but neither he nor General 
Lee seem to have had any knowledge of the great strategic 
consequence of that place ; and the latter, still without re- 
port from his cavalry, fitly termed the " eyes of the army," 
was groping like a blind Titan for his enemy, unconscious 
that Meade's advance columns were within a few hours march 
of his own. 

Such is war — a game of skill and chance — a game of chess, 
and ''blind man's buff" compounded together. 

THE FIRST DAY OP JULY. 

With the dawn of July 1st, Ileth's and Pender's division, 
of Hill's corps, sallied forth from Cashtown to reconnoitre 
and assail the force seen by Pettigrew the day before ; and 
at the same time Kodes' and Early's divisions started for 
Cashtown from Heidlersburg, where they had rested the pre- 
ceding night. Longstreet's corps slowly brought up Lee's 
rear from Chambersburg, and Johnson's division was yet over 
the mountains near Greencastle and Scotland, with Ewell's 
reserve artillery. A little before 10 o'clock Hill's advance 
came up with Buford's cavalrymen, who were dismounted 
and posted as infantry ; and a skirmish commenced which 
swelled into a combat — a combat which swelled into the 
greatest battle ever fought on this continent — for there, un- 
consciously to all, the battle of Gettysburg began. Hill 
advanced cautiously, supposing that he fought infantry, and 
for two hours there were sharp passages between the con- 
testants without important results. 

From the steeple of the Theological Seminary, which 
gives name to the ridge in front of which Buford's troops 
were in line, the signal oflicerof that general at this moment 
discerned in the distance the corps headquarters flag of Rey- 
nolds, and Buford himself, sighting the telescope, recognized 
that succor was coming, and exclaimed " We can now hold 
the place." In a few moments Reynolds himself dashed up, 



18 

and swiftly tifter hitn the First corps, under Doubleday, 
came pouring across the fields, and in a short time a despe- 
rate engagement was raging along the line. Reynolds at 
once dispatched for the Eleventh corps, of Howard, and the 
Third, of Sickles', which were a few miles away, to hasten 
to the field. But while they were being summoned to the 
rescue the intonations of cannon had reached the ears of 
Ewell, Rodes and Early. No other than these " sightless 
couriers of the ait" needed they, and, turning off from the 
Cashtown road, those gallant soldiers pushed on their columns 
toward 'the booming of the guns. Howard's leading brigades 
had scarcely strengthened the lines of Doubleday, when 
Rodes came thundering upon his front, and until two o'clock 
the contending forces charged and countercharged, each 
fighting with an ardor worthy of the great stake that was 
trembling in the balance. 

THE ADVANCE OF EARLY. 

If you will look at the map you will perceive that the 
Union line of battle, parallel with Seminary Ridge, ran almost 
due north and south. The road from Heidlersburg to Get- 
tysburg strikes this position right on the rear of the right 
flank, and on this road Early's veterans — their steps quick- 
ened by every note of the guns — were pressing on, with all 
the celerity which had earned some of them under Jackson 
the soubriquet of the ** foot-cavalry of the Valley." 

It was about 2 o'clock. General Early rode at the division 
head with his staff. A heavy mist was falling, and the hot 
sun of July subdued by its refreshing moisture. As we 
neared the scene of conflict a few cavalry pickets scampered 
off. When reaching an eminence about a mile from the town 
at once the glorious panorama of battle was spread before 
our eyes; and indeed it was 

" A j;lorimi8 Ki;j,bt to .si'c 
To liiui wlio liiul no tViend, no brother tbere.'' 

Aye ! mure glorious still to those whose friends and broth- 

\ 



10 

ers were there — making the field radiant with dcods worthy 
of old Sparta's time, when there were giants upon the earth. 
Just in front, nestling on the slope of Cemetery Hill, lay 
Gettysburg. Fields, rich with the summer harvests, and 
dotted with cosy, rustic homes, stretched forth in our front, 
while on the right of the town, scarce a mile distant, wreathed 
in the smoke of batteries and battalions, could be distinctly 
seen the long lines of Confederate gray and Union blue, now 
rushing to the charge, now pouring volleys into each other's 
bosoms, now commingled in undistinguishable melee, while 
ever and anon there rose over the sullen roar of musketry 
and cannon the mechanical "Hip, hip! hurrah !" of the Fed- 
eral infantry, or soared aloft that sound once heard never to 
be forgotten, the clear, sonorous, hearty, soul-stirring ring of 
the Confederate cheer. General Early saw with a glance 
that he was right on the Federal flank, and that a charge 
with his division would settle the fortunes of the day. " Tell 
Gordon, Hays, Avery, and Smith to double-quick to the 
front," said he, "and open the lines of infantry for the artil- 
lery to pass." Scarce said but done. Colonel Hilary P. 
Jones, with his batteries came thundering to the front with 
his horses at a run ; and with their men at a double-quick, 
Gordon, Hays, and Avery, (commanding Hoke's brigade,) de- 
ployed right and left, while gallant old "Extra Billy" Smith 
formed in reserve. As Jones's guns were getting into posi- 
tion, a battery at the gallop took post in front, and General 
Howard, whose corps was on the Federal right, stretched it 
out and bent it around to head off this portentous movement. 
Midway between us and the town flowed a little creek with 
rugged wooded banks, and as our troops were double-quick- 
ing forward into line. Barlow's division was forming be- 
hind this stream to meet them. Riding behind Gordon's 
brigade, we heard the ringing voice of the gallant Georgian 
as he shouted, " Forward, Georgians," And steadily forward 
across the yellow wheat-fields we saw the line of Georgians, 
Louisianians, and Carolinians roll, their burnished bayonets 



20 

making a silver wave across a cloth of gold. Now they 
disappear in the copse of woods along the stream ; then 
comes the wild cheer, and the crashing volley, and a cloud 
of smoke wraps the combatants ; a moment more and the 
open fields beyond were filled with the heavy, disordered 
masses of Howard's corps flying in wild confusion. The 
slaughter was terrific. In front of Gordon, where Barlow 
was aligned, lay a line of wounded and dead men who had 
fallen as they stood ; and in their midst lay Barlow himself 
solely stricken. Not Dessaix at Marengo, nor Blucher at Wa- 
terloo, struck a more decisive blow. The Federal flank had 
been shrivelled up as a scroll, and the whole force gave way. 
On all sides, pouring up the slopes into Gettysburg, fled the 
broken host, while closely at their heels followed Hill and 
Rodes on the one side and Early on the other. At this time 
a band of Rodes's division struck up a soul-stirring strain, 
and with triumphant music chiming in with the sharp rattle 
of the pursuing muskets, the Confederates drove their beaten 
enemy into and through the streets of the captured town. 

IN GETTYSBURG. 

Reaching the town, the joyous veterans of the Second 
corps exclaimed, as their officers passed along their lines, 
" let us go on !" General Early, the first officer of his rank 
to reach the place, at once sought General Ewell to urge 
"an immediate advance upon the enemy before he could 
recover from his evident dismay," but before he could be 
found a report came from General (better known as "Extra 
Billy") Smith, that a heavy column of infantry, artillery, and 
cavalry was marching upon our left flank on the York road. 
Gordon's brigade had to be detached to go to the threatened 
point, and this for a time diverted attention from the pursuit. 
General Early not finding Ewell, sent a messenger to General 
A. P. Hill urging that an immediate advance be made upon 
the enemy, who had fallen back to the heights beyond the 
town. 



21 

In the mean time General Ewell came up, and he at once 
resolved to seize a wooded height called Gulp's Hill, which 
commanded the enemy's position on the left, as soon as John- 
son's division, yet absent, should arrive. 

Between 5 and G o'clock in the afternoon a '^ rough-and 
ready" looking soldier, bronze-faced, with a heavy stafT in 
his hand, which looked as combative as an Irishman's shille- 
lah, rode up to our lines, and behind him covered with the 
stains of a rapid march, came streaming along, with faces 
eager for the fray, the famous soldiers of the old Stonewall 
division, now under General Edward Johnson — "old Alle- 
ghany" as they loved to call him — who looked as he rode 
with his heavy club at their head as if he could thrash out 
an army himself with that ponderous weapon. 

Now, thought our gallant men, who were chafing to be 
unleashed, we shall go on ; now, thought all, the tide has 
come which "taken at its flood leads on to fortune ;" but in 
the mean time the enemy sent forward a line of infantry and 
occupied the hill which Ewell designed to seize. Our artil- 
lery, from the nature of the field, could not be served to 
advantage, and the report was revived that a column was 
moving upon our left flank. This report was utterly ground- 
less, but before it could be sifted, and Johnson's division 
gotten into position, darkness had thrown its protecting wings 
over the shattered Federal lines. And so the tide went by. 

SHOULD WE HAVE PRESSED ON ? 

It has been the almost universal sentiment of soldiers and 
civilians that a great blunder was made in not pressing on 
after the enemy when he was driven through Gettysburg, 
and Generals Ewell and Lee have both been sharply criticised 
for halting. " Never/' says Mr. Swinton, one of the best 
war-writers, " was pause at the door of victory more fatal to 
the hopes of a commander." * 

* See Swinton's Decisive Battles, p. 332. 



It is true there existed many temptations to press the pur- 
suit. We had met the enemy for the first time on the soil of 
a northern State, and disastrously routed two corps of his 
army, with a loss to them of two cannon and nearly five 
thousand prisoners,* and how shattered their remnants must 
have been is evidenced by the fact that the Eleventh corps, 
which mustered 7,400 muskets that morning, could scarcely 
count half that number that night ; while the First was 
reduced from S,200 to 2,450 — scarcely a fourth being left. 
But General Lee's situation was a peculiar one. The cavalry 
was absent, and he had no information of the whereabouts or 
numbers of his adversary. The prisoners stated that Meade 
with his main force was rapidly approaching Gettysburg, and 
some of our own officers reported that heavy celumns were 
threatening our left flank. Besides we had suffered severe 
losses. Under these circumstances, says General Lee in his 
report, " without information as to its (Meade's army's) prox- 
imity, the strong position which the enemy had assumed 
could not be ^ attacked without danger of exposing the four 
divisions present, already weakened and exhausted by a long 
and bloody struggle, to overwhelming numbers of fresh 
troops,"! and so it was determined to await the arrival of 
Longstreet. 

Now, it happens that General Lee's speculations were en- 
tirely verified, and it is very doubtful indeed whether, if 
accurate information had been possessed as to the enemy's 
situation, a renewal of the attack would have been prudent. 
It is disclosed in the Federal reports of this campaign that 
when General Howard on that morning had marched to the 
relief of Reynolds, he had done (what Napoleon said a good 
general ought always to do in going into battle) provided 
against exactly what followed — a disastrous defeat. 

Noticing that Cemetery Hill, just in rear of Gettysburg, 

*See Swinton's Decisive Battlesj p. 331. 
tSee Lee'a Second Report. 



23 

was a position of commanding importance, be bad posted 
there one of his divisions, cammanded by General Alexander 
von Steinwerh, an accomplished officer, who had been 
schooled in the Prussian service. That officer bad planted 
his artilery along the crest of that hill, and around its base 
were low stone walls rising tier above tier, behind which he 
had posted his infantry. While the battle was raging in 
front he had thrown up lunettes around each gun, and ac- 
cording to the northern historian of Gettysburg, " they were 
not mere heaps of stubble and turf, but solid works of such 
height and thickness as to defy the most powerful bolts which 
the enemy (Confederates) could throw against him, with 
smooth and level platforms on which the guns could be 
worked."* Besides this fresh division, Buford's dismounted 
cavalry division had retired in good order to the crest of this 
hill, and when the two infantry corps were driven back upon 
Cemetery Hill they came, to use the same writer's language, 
'^ into the folds of an impregnable fortress. '-t 

Now, in the light of these events, bold is he who assumes 
to be the censor. Had Ewell hurled his two divisions against 
this natural fortress — now doubly fortified with pick and 
spade — before Johnson came up, and been repulsed by the 
heavy artillery and fresh troops lying in wait, who would not 
have said it was rash, hot-headed, and ill-considered ? Had 
Lee, without waiting for Longstreet, pushed on when he 
came up and then been beaten, who would not have said 
that ardor had gotten the better of his discretion ? And, 
indeed, by the hour Lee arrived, the Twelfth corps, under 
Slocum, and the Third, under Sickles, had gotten within sup- 
porting distance of their comrades, and they actually reached 
the field between 6 and 7 o'clock.^ 

* See Bates' History of the Battle of Gettysburg, p. 70. 
T Ibid, p. 80. 

{ See Bates' History, p. 181, aud Everett's Oration, 4tli vol. Everett's 
Oration and Speeehes, p. (535. Birney's division of the Third corps formed 
on Cemetery Kidj^e about 5 o'clock. See General Birney's statement, Ist 
Aol. Conduct of the War, p. 36(5. 



24 

On the whole, it is ditficult to see that either General Lee 
or General Ewell is open to just criticism for not pushing on; 
though such is my own faith in the superb gallantry of our 
troops that I believe they would have annihilated the forces 
tiien in their front. But this would have been hxr from a 
decisive result, as Meade, with the great body of his army, 
would then have fallen back and formed a new line nearer 
to Washington. 

A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS. 

Tiie conflict of July had been entirely a chapter of acci- 
dents. Commencing with the affair of Ileth's division with 
Buford's cavalry, it had attracted reinforcements from both 
armies by the sound of its guns, as the maelstrom gathers 
into its vortex the craft that float upon the surrounding' 
waters. 

At the very hour when Buford's men were going into 
action an order, dated that very day, was being distributed 
by Meade from his headquarters, at Taneytown, fourteen 
miles away, among his corps commanders, announcing his 
intention " to withdraw his army from its present position and 
form line of battle, with the right resting in the neighborhood 
of Middleburg and the left at Manchester, the general direc- 
tion being that of Pipe creek,"* (which stream is about 
fifteen miles from Gettysburg) ; and when General Reynolds 
rode to Buford's rescue lie fell upon the field to which the 
guns had summoned himt with an order in his pocket to fall 
back from Gettysburg and Emettsburg with the First, Elev- 
enth, and Third corps, which were under him, to Middle- 
burg. 

The tidings of the battle, borne back to Meade at Tanev- 
tovvn, were accompanied with the announcement that General 
Beynolds had fallen. Still he did not go himself to the front 
so slow was he to appreciate that there the great battle- 

* See Conduct of the War, vol. 1, p. '.]'>:]. 
+ Ihitl, p. :'54. 



25 

cloud would burst, but he sent forward General Hancock, 
the best of his lieutenants. That officer reached the field 
just as the broken columns of the First and Eleventh corps 
were flying for refuge to the summit of Cemetery Hill. 
Hancock was a fighting man of resolute gallantry and mag- 
netic presence. He soon restored order along the lines, and, 
sending Wadsworth's division to Gulp's Hill, checkmated the 
movement of Ewell to get that commanding height before 
him.* Having made his dispositions, he rode back to Meade, 
at Taneytown, and reported that the field was favorable for 
a general action. At ten o'clock that night Meade started 
forward, and reached Cemetery Hill at one o'clock, while all 
along behind him the roads were filled by the artillery and 
infantry of his army, pressing on to the stage which fate, 
rather than foresight, had appointed for the great drama of 
war. 

By morning all his corps had reached within supporting 
distance of the field, except the Sixth, which was started 
from Manchester, thirty-six miles distant, the afternoon before. 

On our side all the infantry but Pickett's division was up. 
Stuart, "the indefatigable" — Stuart, "the lion-hearted" — 
with Hampton and "Light-Horse" Lees, had come; — the 
plume that never danced so joyously as in the storm of bat- 
tle — the sabre whose electric light had so often cleaved with 
a flash the path to victory, were ready to lead the squadrons 
to the onset once more. And there crowning the opposite 
ridges — with batteries, bayonets, and sabres, — the Army of 
Northern Virginia, and the Army of the Potomac — surveyed 
each other, marshalled in solid well-ordered array of battle. 

LEE RESOLVES TO ATTACK. 

" It had not been intended," says General Lee (see his first 
report), "to fight a general battle at such a distance from 
our base unless attacked by the enemy, but finding ourselves 

* See General Haucock'e testimony, p. 405, Conduct of the War, vol. 1. 
D 



26 

unexpectedly confronted by the Federal army, it became a 
matter of difficulty to withdraw through the mountains with 
our large trains. At tiie same time the country was unfa- 
vorable for collecting supplies, while in the presence of the 
enemy's main body, as he was enabled to restrain our fora- 
ging parties by occupying the passes of the mountains with 
regular and local troops. A battle thus became, in a meas- 
ure, unavoidable. Encouraged by the successful issue of the 
engagement of the first day, and in view of the valuable 
results that would ensue from the defeat of the army of Gen- 
eral Meade, it was thought advisable to renew the attack." 
So the first day's fight had changed our commander's plan ; 
and when lie left a conference held with Generals Ewell, 
Early, and Rodes, at the close of the day, the understanding 
was that with the light the contest should be renewed. In 
planning for the assault the vigilant eye of Lee had not failed 
to take in the salient points of 

THE FIELD OF JJATTLE. 

Away to llie right of our line there rose up a bold pro- 
montory known as "Little Round-Top" — a bald granite 
spur constituting a natural fortress, and commanding from the 
Federal left the Cemetery Ridge, on which Meade's arnjy 
was aligned — a Gibraltar to tiie Union general once pos- 
sessed — a key-position unlocking his strength — if once in 
Confederate hands. About a quarter of a mile further on 
south rises the still bolder knob known as "Round-Top." 
Between Little Round-Top and Gettysburg stretches the 
Cemetery Ridge due north in a straight line for two miles. 
Just in the rear and south of the town this ridge curves like 
a fish-hook and projects into Cemetery Hill, which derives its 
name from the town grave-yard, thei'eon, wherein 

" The riule fui-flarijeis of the hiinilft sleep — " 

Then the ridue bends around eastward, and a rugged 
wooded height, with rocky face, known as Gulp's Hill, guards 
the eastern flank. 



This hill commands Cemetery Hill iVoin the iiurlh-eiist, as 
Little Round-Top commands the ridge from the south-west. 

The left wing of our army, looking due south, faced Gulp's 
and Cemetery hills. The centre and riglit wi.igs, almost at 
right angles with the left wing, looked east-.vard, facing the 
Cemetery Ridge. 

General Lee's plan was for Ewell to attack Cemetery Hill 
"by way of diversion" "at dawn," to be converted into a 
real attack, if opportunity offered, while Longstreet was to 
make the main attack on the enemy's riglit, seize Round - 
Top and Little Round-Top, and turn the Federal flank. 

FAILUKE OF THE SECOND DAl's PLANS " SOME ONE HAS BLUN- 
DERED " WHO f 

Before dawn while marshalling his troo[)S for the assault, 
Ewell received orders from General Lee to wait for the sound 
of Longstreet's guns.* But the dawn came, and no guns 
heralded the action. Said Mr. Edward Everett in his oration 
at Gettysburg: "And here I cannot but remark on the 
Providential inaction of the rebel army. Had the contest 
been renewed by it at daylight on tlie 2J of July, with the 
First and Eleventh corps exhausted by the battle and retreat, 
the Third and Twelfth weary from their forced march, and 
the Second, Fifth, and Sixth not yet arrived, nothing but a 
miracle could have saved the army from a great disaster. 
Instead of this the day dawned, the sun rose, the cool hours 
of the morning passed, and a considerable part of the after- 
noon wore away without the slightest aggressive movement 
on the part of the enemy. Thus time was given for half of 
our forces to arrive and take their places in the lines, while 
the rest of the army enjoyed a much-needed half- day's re- 
pose."t 

I have searched in vain all accessible sources of informa- 
mation for some explanatien of General Lee's failure to carry 

" See General E well's Report. 

t See vol. 4, Everett's Orations, p. T);!?. 



2S 

out the plan resolved upon the night before, — a plan emi- 
nently sagacious in itself, and which, had it been pursued 
promptly at dawn, would doubtless have resulted in the dis- 
astrous overthrow of the Federal Army, so graphically indi- 
cated by Mr. Everett 5 for Little Round-Top, which, passing 
strange to say, had not been occupied by the enemy, would 
have fallen into our hands, and the key of victory gained 
without a struggle ; nor was it occupied till later in the day, 
when our troops were moving upon it.* 

The secret of that fatal delay, which, to my mind, was 
the great mistake or misfortune of the campaign, may per- 
haps be forever buried in our commander's bosom. I appre- 
hend that the tardiness of General Longstreet's movements, 
and the prolonged absence of Pickett's division was the cause; 
but lest injustice be done to General liOngstreet I forbear 
expressing an opinion. At any rate, the ftiult was not Lee's, 
for he was anxious to attack at dawn ; he sent back orders 
to hasten the march of the absent troops (see his report) ; 
and some overruling reason must have stayed his hand. But, 
alas! the opportunity was lost forever. "Opportunity," 
saith the old adage, " has hair in front, behind she is bald ; 
catch her by the forelock and a little child can hold her, but 
once gone, Jupiter himself cannot catch her again." And 
such was our experience at Gettysburg. 

THE SECOND DAY's ATTACK AND ITS RESULTS. 

Finally, by 3 o'clock the preparations were made. The 
Union army had been formed, with Slocum's Twelfth corps 
and Wadsworth's division of the First holding Gulp's Hill 
and the right flank — opposite to Johnson's division. How- 
ard's Eleventh Corps, with Eobinson's and Doubleday's 
divisions of the First held Cemetery Hill, opposite to Early's 
and Rodes's divisions. Then came Hancock's Second corps, 
opposite to Hill's, on Cemetery Ridge, and Sickles's Third 
corps, extending towards Round-Top, opposite to Longstreet. 

* See vol. 1, Condnct of the War, p. 332. 



29 

Sykes's Fifth corps was in reserve, on the Federal right, and 
Sedgwick, who reached the field just as the battle was com- 
mencing, took place in reserve upon the left. 

I should have little pleasure, even did time permit, in de- 
tailing the events of this day ; for, though it abounds in 
bright exploits, the attack was rendered disjointed and 
inefl^ectual by strange misunderstandings — to use no harsher 
term. 

Longstreet, with Hood's and McLuw's divisions, struck the 
Federal left, and came within an ace of possessing Little 
Round-Top, which was hastily occupied by the enemy after 
our lines were put in motion. As soon as this attack on the 
Federal right got well under way Johnson's division, with 
magnificent valor, rushed up the rough, rocky ledges of 
Gulp's Hill ; and Hoke's and Hays's brigades of Early's 
division, who took their signal of assault from Johnson's 
guns, charged the enemy's batteries on Cemetery Hill and 
planted their standards on its summit, capturing his cannon, 
routing two lines of infantry, and cutting the right centre of 
the Federal line.* 

But here Wo, the while ! this splendid sally was robbed of 
its fruits. Early was to attack when he heard Johnson's 
guns; Rodes, on Early's right, was to continue it when he 
heard Early's guns. Early's part was nobly done, and Rodes 
started to fulfill his part. But Rodes, it seems, had a much 
greater distance to traverse than Early, and for some reason, 
nowhere explained in Lee's or Ewell's reports (General 
Rodes's report I have been unable to see,) at the time when 
the men of Hoke's and Hays's brigades surmounted the 
Federal works, the gallant Rodes was just moving out to 
assault those in his front. Before he did so the Federal re- 
serves were hurled upon Early, and these two thin brigades, 

" Hoke's brigade Avas commanded in this battle (General Hoke being 
absent, wounded) by Colonel J. E. Avery, of the Sixth North Carolina 
Regiment — one oi the bravest and best of the many excellent soldiers 
that North Carolina gave to the Confederate cause. 



-30 

wasted by the charge and separated from all support, were 
driven from the crest by fresh troops, and the prize fell from 
the victorious hands which had already grasped it. 

The shades of night had fallen before the battle closed, 
and, though everywhere the troops had borne themselves 
in a manner worthy of their fame, the unhappy miscarriage 
of Rodes's movement had prevented the consummation of 
Lee's well-designed plan. 

But some advantages had been gained and some trophies 
won. On our right the Federal line had been driven back 
by Longstreet, some guns and standards captured, and some 
advanced positions carried. On our left Johnson's division 
had driven the enemy from his works, and had maintained 
an advanced footing on Gulp's Hill. In Early's front the 
soldiers of the old North State, led by Colonel Avery — who 
there sealed his devotion to the Southern cause with his heart's 
blood — had won another wreath for the brow of Carolina ; 
and the gallant Louisianians, led by Harry Hays, had brought 
down from the crest of Cemetery Hill four regimental stand- 
ards, seized from the cannon's mouth, and after a fierce hand- 
to-hand wrestle with the infantry which defended them. 

THE LOUISIANIANS. 

Brave spirits of Louisiana ! Now, deeper in misfortune — 
hence to our hearts closer, and to memory dearer. Leading 
one of the regiments that climbed the summit of that terrible 
crest was Davidson B. Penn, a native of Virginia, and now, 
by the voice of his people, the rightful Lieutenant-Governor 
of the Pelican State. Take heart, brave leader and brave 
people ! To-night your old comrades of the Army of North- 
ern Virginia send you fraternal greetings. No longer sepa- 
rated from each other by a line of fire, the hearts of the 
liberty-loving people of this great nation, whether they once 
beat under the Confederate gray or the Union blue, now beat 
in sympathy with your brave endeavor to restore Louisiana to 



31 

the sisterhood of States, with a government worthy of the 
republican name, and of the Caucasian race. 

The gallant souls who met you in the shock of battle 
know, as well as we who cheered you on, that the stout arms 
which drove the bayonets through the Federal lines on that 
" well-foughten field " were filled with blood that can never 
flow in the feeble pulses of sycophants and slaves. Side by 
side the boys in blue and the boys in gray are coming to 
your rescue. Over the tumults of the polls we hear the 
pibroch ringing; and in 1S76, when the guns are heralding 
the hundredth anniversary of freedom's birth, God grant that 
they may sound to Louisiana the dawn of its resurrection ! 

THE FINAL DAY. 

There was this significant feature in the second day's fight : 
The Confederate troops had everywhere borne themselves 
with unsurpassed audacity and intrepidity, carrying the most 
difficult positions by storm ; and they could well say to their 
countrymen, with the Athenian general, that ^' so far as their 
fate depended on them they were immortal." 

They liad failed, but from mistakes and misunderstandings 
of their superiors. This fact only increased General Lee's 
unbounded faith in his men, and he resolved to advance again. 
" The result of this day's operations," says he, " induced the 
belief that with proper concert of action, and with the in- 
creased support that the positions gained on the right would 
enable the artillery to render the assaulting columns, we 
should ultimately succeed, and it was accordingly determined 
to renew the attack."* The general plan was unchanged. 
Longstreet was to assail the left centre, and Ewell the ex- 
treme right. 

Early in the day Johnson's division, on our left, had a 
prolonged struggle, and drove the enemy from a part of his 
entrenchments, but was unable to carry the main works on 

* See Lee's Second Report. 



32 

the crest of Gulp's Hill. It was designed that Longstreet 
should attack simultaneously with him ; but the dispositions 
were, for some reason, so slow that Johnson had concluded 
his drawn combat before Longstreet was ready to begin. It 
was arranged now that Hood's and McLaws's divisions should 
guard our right flank ; then, Pickett, — strengthened on his left 
by Heth's division, under Pettigrew, and Lane's and Scales's 
brigades of Pender's division, under Trimble; and on his right 
by Wilcox's brigade of Anderson's division, — was to constitute 
the assaulting column. At 7 o'clock that morning the fresh 
division of Pickett, which had rested the night before a few 
miles from the field, marched to the position from which it 
was to be launched upon the enemy's works, and formed in 
line just behind Seminary Ridge, protected from view by 
the swell of ground and the foliage of the oak forest that 
grows along its crest. From the summit of this ridge the 
long grim line of Cemetery Ridge, just opposite, loomed up 
in clear profile against the summer sky, bristling with the 
artillery and infantry lines of the foe ; and all during the 
hot hours of morning and noon the men picked for the assault 
contemplated the frowning heights against which they were 
to be hurled. Green fields decked forth in all the rich gar- 
niture of fertile summer-time, here and there separated by 
stone walls and fences, filled the intervening space — a slope 
down, then a valley, and then a slope again right up to the 
batteries and lines charged with death in every form that 
lead, and iron, and steel could be wrought by the destructive 
genius of man. 

THE CANNONADE. 

Upon the crest of Seminary Ridge General Lee had plan- 
ted about one hundred and twenty guns, covering the front 
of his storming column.* Right opposite, about ninety guns 
faced them, and on either flank from Cemetery Hill and 

* General Meade estimates our gnus theu engaged at 125. See vol 1. 
Conduct of the War, p. 333-338. Mr. Swiuton places tbeui at 155. I 
have no accurate information, but think I'iO about right. 



33 

Round Top other batteries, comprising two hundred more 
guns, were ranged to join in chorus. To prepare the way, 
our batteries were first to cannonade the enemy's lines, and 
us they closed the infantry were to move out and pierce with 
their bayonets the Federal left centre. At 1 o'clock a single 
gun broke the Sabbath-like stillness that had brooded for 
hours over the field, then another single gun — the precon- 
certed signal — and then all Seminary Ridge burst forth with 
flames, as over one hundred guns poured forth their iron 
charges upon the Federal lines. Gun answered gun, and 
then for two hours the two armies were wrapt in the smoke 
of the most tremendous cannonade that ever in the open 
field darkened the sky of the Western world ; shells screamed, 
rushing through the air like devils on wings of fire ; through 
murky, sulphurous clouds the sun glared " with blood-shot 
eye;" the earth itself was tremulous, as if internal commo- 
tion shook its foundations ; and so rapid were the discharges 
of cannon, that the sound of no particular gun could be dis- 
tinguished — no more than the roar of a single wave when 
angry ocean tosses its billows mountain-high in midwinter 
storm. Nor was this, as is generally the case with artillery 
duels, mere ''sound and fury, signifying nothing." Our in- 
fantry were for the most part sheltered, but on the Federal 
side, says the historian of Gettysburg, '' notwithstanding 
every precaution was taken to shelter the Union troops, the 
destruction was terrible. Men were torn limb from limb and 
blown to atoms by the villainous shells ; horses were disem- 
bowelled and thrown prostrate to writhe in death agonies; 
caisons filled with ammunition were exploded; cannon 
rent; and steel-banded gun-carriages knocked into shapeless 
masses."* 

THE CHARGE. 

7\t the end of two hours the fire slackened, — then closed 
like some grand orchestral chorus announcing the curtain's 



*8<"c Biitts' History of llie Battle of Gettysburj;;, p. 154. 
E 



34 

rise as tragedy itself steps forth upon the stage. As silence 
once more reigned over the smoking heights, from behind 
the sable curtain that still hung over Seminary Ridge, there 
emerged the long double lines of the Confederate infantry, in 
none of the " pomp and circumstance of war," but clad in 
sombre homespun, brown and gray, with nothing bright 
about them, save the blood-red battle flags twinkling in their 
midst, and the glittering sheen of cold steel. Old Virginia 
had the post of honor that day. In the centre of the assault- 
ing line moved Pickett's men " in battle's magnificently stern 
array," Kemper on the right connecting with Wilcox ; Gar- 
nett on the left connecting with Pettigrew ; Armistead be- 
hind them — Mrginians all. Down the slope from Seminary 
Ridge they moved forth to the assault, not impetuously, says 
Mr. Swinton, "at the run or double-quick, as has been re- 
presented in the over-colored descriptions in which the fa- 
mous charge has been so often painted, but with a disciplined 
steadiness — a quality noticed by all who saw this advance 
as its characteristic feature."* Mounted on his familiar iron- 
gray war-horse, Traveller, General Lee, from the summit of 
Seminary Ridge, watched his veterans as they advanced to 
this supreme endeavor, as did Napoleon from the slope of La 
Belle Alliance watch the advance of the Old Guard upon 
the allied centre at Waterloo. Scarcely had they debouched 
into the field, before once more Cemetery Ridge, in their front, 
was fringed with fire, and into their faces came the hissing 
shot and shell. And, unfortunately for us, our own batteries, 
having nearly exhausted their amunition, (a fact unknown to 
General Lee when the assault commence'd.) were <inable to 
reply.t 

Our lel'r, under the noble Trinible, who was soon struck 
down, staggered at the start, but soon regained their step ; 
and while shell burst overhead, and solid shot opened fright- 
ful gaps, the lines closed up and moved on. Half way over 

'See Swintou's Decisive Battles, j). 313. 

t.See Lee's yecciiid l?c{>iirt. WIiuhc I'unlt wiis this ? 



this death-devoured field Pickett's men paused and rearranged 
their lines, and then moved obliquely to the loft, so as to 
strike "the highest point and npparent centre of the ene- 
my."* Now, it happened that Wilcox did not close on to 
Pickett's right, thus leaving a gap open upon his flank ; and 
now, at close range, the enemy from his shotted guns poured 
canister right into their bosoms ; but still they pressed right 
on. And now from behind stones walls and trenches on the 
top plateau of Cemetery Ridge, the tire of musketry flashed 
into their faces. Kemper and Garnett, while leading their 
men like the Paladins of old, had fallen ; but the men faltered 
not, and with a bold forward rush they clove the Federal 
line. Brave Armistead, leading his men afoot, sprung upon 
the enemy's works, while all around him clustered the reso- 
lute soldiers of the Virginia Division, who had 

" Charged an Aruiy 
While all the world wondered.'' 

With calm countenance, but heart elate. General Lee, from 
his post, with his field-glass fixed upon this point, now saw 
the battle-flags waving over the smoke that wreathed the 
crest of Cemetery Ridge, like a cluster of blood-red mountain 
blossoms amidst thick foilage ; and for the while Pickett's 
men stood conquerors on this blood-won summit, while all 
along their front the Federal troops, dismayed by their as- 
tonishing intrepidity, fled the field, leaving their batteries in 
their victors' hands. 

But, alas ! they stood alone. Fur at least twenty min- 
utes — (I am told by Capt. John Holmes Smith, of the Lynch- 
burg Home Guard, who, though wounded, climbed that 
perilous height) — the few who got there held undisputed 
possession of the field. But where were their supports ? — 
where were their coadjutors ? Pettigrew's and Trimble's 
men had broken before the tornado of canister in their front, 

*Major Walter Harrison in his volume, entitled Pickett's Men so states. 
See p. 183. 



and had disappeared.* And now, upon their right, the gap 
left by Wilcox was being filled by Federal troops ; and 
marshalling in their front the Federal reserves, summoned 
from every point to the rescue stood in masses four lines 
deep. 

Anxiously they looked for support, but instead of succor 
their antagonists closed upon them front and flank, and this 
little wasted band could no more live, in the concentric lines 
of fire emptied on their devoted heads, than the child's play- 
boat could breast the surge of an ocean-storm. 

Sword in hand, on the farthest verge of the advance, 
brave Armistead fell, death-stricken ; and from this highest 
pinnacle, to which ever the waves of the Confederate war 
dashed their bloody spray, the surviving hand-ful of Pickett's 
men relaxed their hold, and sullenly turned their ftices back 
to the Conferate lines and toward tHe setting sun. The sun, 
alas ! whose waning rays lighted for the last time to many a 
fallen hero the scenes of earth — the sun, alas ! whose waning 
rays seemed prophetic of the waning cause, dearer to them 
than light or life. And so, Virginia's spear was broken — the 
banner of the Confederacy was blighted — the Battle of 
Gettysburg was done ! 

THE LOSSES. 

I pause to contemplate the havoc wrought in these three 
days of battle. We have authentic official reports that the 
loss on the Federal side amounted to 2,834 killed, 1-8,709 
wounded, and G,643 missing — in all, 23,186. t 

The author of " Harper's Pictorial History of the War " — 
which could be more fitly termed " Harper's Pictorial Fib " — 
estimates our loss at 36,000 in all; and Mr. Bates, the his- 

*Geueral Trimble lost a leg in this charge. There ia no reproach for 
him. General Heth had been wounded in the first days' fifi;ht, and 
was absent, and his Division, nnder General Pettigrew, had been deci- 
mated in the first days' fight. General Trimble had been placed in com- 
mand during the engagement. 

t See General Meade's Report. 



37 

toriau of Gettysburg, estimates it at 27,500 wounded, 5,500 
killed, and 13,G21 prisoners, which would make 46,621 * — a 
most preposterous conclusion, worthy only of Gulliver or 
Munchausen. 

I am enabled to state from the official reports the losses of 
two corps of our army. General Longstreet's losses were 
933 killed, 4,453 wounded, and 2,373 missing— total, 7,659.t 
General Ewell's were SS3 killed, 3,S57 wounded, and 1,347 
missing — total, 6,094. t Aggregate in the two corps, 
13,753. It is not probable that Hill's losses exceeded Long- 
street's, as he suffered less than any corps-commander on the 
second day. Putting them at 8,000 we would have as grand 
aggregate 21,753. This includes artillery and infantry ; and 
allowing 1,000 more, which must be excessive, for cavalry 
and for nurses who were left with the wounded, and still our 
losses would be less than those of the enemy. 

In Pickett's division the frightful loss attests its devoted 
courage. It carried into action four thousand four hundred 
and eighty-five muskets, about four thousand seven hundred 
rank and file. Its loss was two thousand eight hundred and 
sixty-three. Two of its brigadiers (Armistead and Garnett) 
were killed, and the third (Kemper) wounded, but, thank 
Heaven, not lost. Of fifteen regimental commanders seven 
were killed and eight wounded ; and of its whole comple- 
ment of field oflicers only one, the gallant Lieutenant-Colonel 
Joseph R. Cabell, who was afterwards killed at Drewry's 
farm, returned from the charge unscathed. 

NUMBERS ENGAGED. 

As to the numbers engaged the Federals have given us 
pretty thorough information as to their side. General Meade 
estimated his available force at 95,000 men and about 300 

" See Bates' History, p. 199-200. 

t See ofllcial Report iu Southern Mngaziue for April, 1871. Appendix, 
p. 55. 

t See General Ewell's Report in Southern Magazine for June, 187.3, p. 
695. 



38 

cannon.* Some of these guarded his (rains, and many must 
have straggled. Discounting ten per cent, for these, he 
must have had in his seven army corps not less than 80,000 
men upon the field. 

The Federal estimates of our force are very extravagant, 
and some of them not a little curious. General Hooker says 
in his testimony before the Committee on the Conduct of the 
War : " With regard to the enemy's force I had reliable 
information. Two Union men had counted them as they 
passed through ITagerstown, and in order that there might 
be no mistake they compared notes every night, and if their 
counts differed they were satisfactorily adjusted by com- 
promise. In round numbers Lee had 91,000 infantry and 
280 pieces of artillery. Marching with that column were 
6,000 cavalry."t He then estimates Stuart's cavalry at 
5,000, and sums up his count of Lee's men as 90,000 infan- 
try, 4,000 to 5,000 artillery, and 10,000 cavalry— in all 
about 104,000. 

The miraculous performance of these two reliable Union 
men can be well appreciated when it is remembered that all 
of Lee's army did not pass through Hagerstown — Early's 
command, for one, going through Sharpsburg — and this 
spectacle of a commander basing a calculation on such trivial 
statements can only excite ridicule. I am not able to state 
General Lee's force, but I can contribute a few items which 
may serve partially toward an estimate. I hold in my hand 
the original tri-monthly field return of Early's division, made 
and signed by myself as its Adjutant-General, on the 20th of 
June, two days before it crossed the Potomac. The total 
present for duty was 514 officers and 5,124 enlisted men; 
aggregate, 5,638. This division was fully an average one 
of the army. Pickett's Division, as stated by IMajor Walter 
Harrison, its Adjutant-General, numbered on the field 4,481 

* See General Meade's testimony, 1 vol. Conduct of the War, p. 337-8. 
1 1 vol. Conduct of the War, p. 173, 



39 

muskets — about 4,700 rank and file. But allowing 6,000 as 
the general division strength, we would have 54,000 men. 
The cavalry could not have exceeded 7,000, nor the artillery 
3,000, and allowing ten per cent, discount for straggling and 
train-guards, about 56,000 would represent our available 
strength. This, I believe, runs over the mark, but it shows 
how groundless are the wild speculations of the writers who 
have put our numbers at such high figures. 

We have also some general data which show that the 
weight of numbers must have greatly preponderated on the 
Federal side. In a work entitled a " History of the Battle 
of Gettysburg," from the pen of Samuel P. Bates, State his- 
torian of Pennsylvania, we have a tabular statement showing 
the regiments of both armies. From that it appears that 
there were one hundred and sixty-four Confederate and two 
hundred and forty-one Federal regiments of infantry engaged 
— that is, seventy-seven regiments in excess of ours. Three 
hundred is a large average regiment, and allowing that as 
the general average, our force would be forty-nine thousand 
two hundred, and the Federal force seventy-two thousand 
three hundred — a result, I think, nearly approximating the 
facts. * 

THE AFTER PART. 

The first impulseof General Meade, when he saw Pickett's 
men break and fall back, was to hurl forward his whole army 
in counter charge against Lee. He has been severely criti- 

* Mr. Bates states that Leo -went into battle -with 72,000 men. See his 
History, p. 198. This work, written in a fair and manly spirit, though 
not disguising strong Northern partialities, is marred by its evident 
worthlessness so far as computation of numbers and losses are concerned. 
The archives of Confederate History will ere long bring to light data 
from which the truth may be elucidated; and in the mean time it is to 
be hoped that Confederate soldiers who have means of information will 
carefully preserve and record their testimony on the subject. The proba- 
bility is that there has been a double coxmt of onr Josses in some cases ; 
that is that those reported by our officers as wounded, and afterwards 
fiilliiig into the enemy's hands on the retreat, have been also reported by 
the Federals as captured — and thus the wounded captive counted as two 
men lost ! In some such way alone can we account for the extravagant 
estimates of our losses, directly at war with our authentic official reports. 



40 

cised by many of his Generals for not doing so ; but it is 
well for him that his '^ native hue of resolution " was so soon 

" Sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought." 

The Federal army, as well as their commander, were 
appalled by the amazing boldness and bravery they had 
beheld. They were shocked and shattered by the terrific 
blow received. The arm that parried the stroke had been 
paralyzed by it; the victor stood aghast upon the field of 
carnage ; the hand which wielded the scythe was too weak 
to strike back at the rival reaper which had mowed down 
his own ranks like a desolating storm. 

In the history of battles we generally tind that a repulse 
like this is followed by the dismay, confusion, and flight of 
the defeated army. But not thus passed away the glory of 
the Army of Northern Virginia, nor of that great commander 
who, in the twinkling of an eye, saw the brimming cup of 
victory dashed from his lips. 

On our right Hood and McLaws, in the centre Anderson, 
and on the left the whole corps of Ewell, stood as steady and 
unmoved as if they had witnessed the mimic evolutions of a 
holiday's review ; and not only not dismayed, but eager to 
welcome their antagonists " with bloody hands to hospitable 
graves." 

As the remnant of Pickett's men fell back within our lines 
General Lee rode to meet them. ''Never mind," said he, as 
he urged them to re-form, '^ we'll talk of this afterwards ; 
now we want all good men to rally," and to General Wilcox, 
who rode up, he said quietly and cheerfully : " Never mind. 
General, all this has been ni}' fault, and you must help me 
out of it the best way you can." 

As the soldiers caught sight of their beloved commander, 
wliose serene, miijestic countenance showed no trace of dis- 
;ip[)uintinent, they raised their hats, and, ciieering, turned to 
their posts; and many a ragged veteran, with one arm 
wounded, grasped his musket in the other and stood ready 



41 

to do or die. In a short time our lines were re-arranged, 
and so effectually and coolly that, as said by Colonel Free- 
mantle, a British officer, who was an eye-witness, " There 
was much less noise, fuss, or confusion than at an ordinary 
field-day." * 

During the whole of the next day the whole Army of 
Northern Virginia stood in line of battle on Seminary Ridge, 
confronting in solid array the Army of the Potomac. It was 
rainy and chilly, and between the two hosts lay the thick- 
crowded victims of the battle, making the field in verity a 
valley of the shadow of death. 

Then slowly our columns turned their faces toward Vir- 
ginia, while slowly and timidly following the Army of the 
Potomac, hung upon our rear, willing enough to wound but 
yet afraid to strike. The instructions of Meade to his subor- 
dinates were by no means to bring on a general engagement ; 
and on the night of the 13th of July, we recrossed the swollen 
waters of the Potomac, and stood again, in thinned ranks 
but unbroken spirit, upon the soil of the Old Dominion. 

CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 

Thus, my comrades, I have told you in unvarnished lan- 
guage the story of Gettysburg. 

My chief object has been to state facts, which will stand 
as landmarks of Confederate history, rather than to attempt 
mellifluous phrases which would roll away like rippling 
waters. And these — selected from a mass — are related only 
in the hope of stimulating farther researches and expositions, 
and not in the vain belief that they comprehend even the 
half of these sad but brilliant annals. 

For many reasons it is important to you, and to our people, 
that the truth respecting this great action should be studi- 
ously explored and fully recounted. Fought at the farther- 
most Northern point to which our armies penetrated at any 

*See Rev. John Wm. Jones' Reminiscences of General Lee. ■. . 

F 



42 

time, it is projected into a conspicuousness which belongs to 
no other field. Its result increased in the North the promi- 
nence imparted to it by its geographical location ; and 
Northern painters, sculptors, essayists, orators, and historians 
have exhausted the resources of art and language in pictur- 
ing its actors and its scenes, and in celebrating the real, and 
too frequently the fictitious, exploits which the Union troops 
performed. 

Above all, it marked a decisive turn in the fortunes of war. 
It was, as Mr. Swinton styles it, " the high-water mark of 
the rebellion." It was indeed, what the historian Hallam so 
finely says of the victory won by Charles Martel over the 
invading Saracens between Tours and Poictiers, " one of those 
few battles of which the contrary event would have essen- 
tially varied the drama of the world in all its subsequent 
scenes." For had the grand assault on Cemetery Kidge 
been compensated by results proportioned to the genius 
which directed and the courage which made it, Baltimore 
and Washington would have been its prizes, foreign recog- 
nition its reward, and the establishment of the Confederate 
States as an independent nation its final fruitage. 

On the 4111 day of July, 1S63, while messengers were 
bearing back dispatches that carried unutterable grief to 
every Southern home, the telegraphic wires, throughout the 
North, were flashing with the news ; bonfires and joyous 
bells were welcoming the tidings, that Pemberton had stacked 
arms before Grant at Vicksburg, and that Lee had been re- 
pulsed by Meade at Gettysburg. At once despondent hearts 
were elated ; clamorous peace-men were silenced ; distracted 
councils were harmonized ; a divided people were united. 
The rich, populous, world-assisted North stood in phalanx 
against the thin, impoverished, and beleaguered people of 
the South. The policy of attrition was inaugurated, and 
henceforth the struggle — though radiant with all the virtues 
that heroism, skill, and self-sacrifice could put forth — was 
only a contest between the snnds of the hour-glass and time. 



43 

While these causes have conspired to direct the eyes of 
the world to the field of Gettysburg, they have made it to us 
a sore subject, reviving sorrow for " the unreturning brave" 
who fell there, increasing the poignancy of defeat, by the 
contrast between the bright promise of the first day and 
the disastrous realizations of the third, and bringing to mind 
the sad refrain : 

" Of all sad words of tongue or pen, 
The saddest are these — it might have been." 

Therefore its glorious annals have been neglected on our 
side ; criticisms and censures upon gallant and worthy officers 
have gone unchallenged ; and as yet no hand has unrolled the 
graphic scroll that shall tell to time the deeds which are 
worthy of eternity. Let no Confederate shrink before the 
name of Gettysburg because it was dark with disaster and 
bitter with disappointment. 

It was the remark of Wellino;ton that the saddest thing 
next to a defeat was victory. With us not less glorious than 
any victory was this defeat. 

The gallant Frenchman blushes for Sedan and Metz the 
blush of shame, but with us the cheek may well glow with 
honest pride as we recall the fact, that on the day of our mis- 
fortunes the flame of liberty was fed with the richest 
libation ever poured upon her altars, and glory opened to the 
Confederate brotherhood who gathered around them the 
doors of immortality. The open fields over which the 
unsheltered heroes moved tell, more eloquently than the 
emblazoned pages of history, the tale of their devotion, and 
the everlasting hills of Cemetery Ridge raise aloft to Heaven 
the records of their everlasting fame. 

And now we may apply to them the words of Pericles, 
pronounced in memory of the Athenians who fell in the 
Samian war : " They are become immortal, like the Gods, 
(or the Gods themselves are not visible to us, but from the 



44 

honors they receive, and the happiness they enjoy, we con- 
clude they are immortal ; and such should those brave men 
be who die for their country." 

GENERAL LEE. 

Nor let the Confederate shrink, before that critic who, 
from the serene atmosphere of his sanctum, steps forth to 
pluck a laurel from the reputation of that great commander 
who so boldly attempted what others would pale to think of. 
With the fall of Vicksburg imminent. General Lee felt that 
the hour demanded this Herculean effort. With the spirit 
of a Caesar or a Napoleon he bravely cast, and bravely stood, 
the hazard of the die. By the very audacity of his well- 
aimed stroke he deserved — by the steady heroism of Pickett's 
men he well-nigh won — and only by a series of those curious 
accidents which in the game of war confound the wisdom of 
the wise, — did he lose, — that crowning triumph which his 
supreme endeavor was so well devised to win. 

*' It was all my fault," said he ; but not such will be the 
verdict of the just historian, who with clear eye and steady 
hand, shall trace, through the tumultuous and sanguinary 
incidents of the day, the course of him who, after exposing 
his person to all the dangers of the fray, would crucify, on 
self-erected cross, his own illustrious name, and make that 
reputation, more precious than life itself, vicarious sacrifice 
for his lieutenants and his men. 

And when the moralist shall seek the highest example of 
what is heroic and grand in action, and martyr-like in spirit, — 
that he may erect before humankind a model, that shall 
warm its finest fancies, and excite its highest aspirations, — 
he shall find it in the person of Robert E. Lee, upon the 
summit of Seminary Ridge, the mount of his transfiguration, 
where, sublimating all earthy instincts, the Divinity in his 
bosom shone translucent through the man, and his spirit 
rose up into the Godlike. 



45 

And the dny shall dawn when here in the Capitol Square 
we shall ]<Mik again upon the warrior's form and face, 
moulded in p«'rennial bronze — shall see once more our great 
commander, mounted on Traveler, his battle steed, the seem- 
ing image of Majesty and Victory, Here in the after-time, 
when we too shall be sleeping under the sod with our 
departed comrades, our sons and daughters shall look up to 
that commMtiding presence, rejoicing to remember that their 
fathers fought under him. And here the eye of the way- 
farer, the patriot, and the pilgrim shall grow brighter, as it 
contemplates with one glance three illustrious and congenial 
spirits, born to Virginia, given to humanity, world-renowned, 
George Washington, Stonewall Jackson, and Robert 
Edmund Lee. 

" O, good gray head, wliicb all men knew; 
O, voice from which their omens all men drew ; 
O, iron nerve, to true occat^ion trne ; 
O, fall'n at length, that tower of strength 
Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew. 

Not once or twice in onr State's rough storyt 

The path of duty was the way to glory. 

Let his great example stand 

Colossal — seen of every land, 

And keep the soldier (irm, the statesniau pure, 

Till in all lands and thro' all human story 

The path of duty be the way to glory. 

And let the land whose hearths he saved from shame 

For many and many an age proclaim, 

At civic revel and pomp and game. 

And when the long-illumined cities flame, 

Their ever loyal iron leader's fame. 

With houor, honor, honor, honor to him — 

Eternal houor to his name." 



f The vprliinge of tliis line lias been slightly cluinged, from the text of Tennyson's noble 
Ode, to suit the occasion. 



31+77-5 



